


Five Minutes with Eurus Holmes

by The_Evil_I



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-19
Updated: 2017-01-19
Packaged: 2018-09-18 12:17:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9384686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Evil_I/pseuds/The_Evil_I
Summary: Five minutes.  Fine minutes was all it took for Eurus Holmes and Jim Moriarty to conspire to almost ruin Sherlock's life.  This is a fic about what that conversation could have looked like.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This, honestly, is the biggest thing that I wanted to see after watching The Final Problem. Besides canon Johnlock, obvs. But since that’s never happening I’m trying to find some positives in the episode we were given. 
> 
> It took Eurus and Moriarty five minutes to plan Sherlock’s downfall, to set in motion events that had implications years down the line, through Moriarty’s death and beyond. I am fascinated that the two of them could plan something so intricate and so malevolent in so little time. Their little psychopath mating dance still gives me the heebie-jeebies. 
> 
> And, if S4 of Sherlock has taught me anything, it’s that if I want to see something happen I have to do it myself. I am not, however, nearly as clever as either of these characters. I hope I did them the slightest bit of justice.

There was a strange activity in the air on the morning of December 25th, 2010. A meaningless date at the best of times and imbued only with the reverence of a deluded and delusional populace seeking light and meaning in a dark, meaningless world. Today, however, _was_ special. Today, Mycroft was giving her a treat. A Christmas present. Because he was and would always be a soft man, fallible and riddled with weaknesses. Because it meant more to him to give than it meant for her to receive. It alleviated his guilt and anger at keeping her here and using her like a tool and Eurus was going to get something out of it that Mycroft couldn’t yet begin to understand. 

Just a name--Moriarty. Just a tendril of information gleaned from the smallest of clues she found while doing Mycroft’s busy work. Did he not understand how much there was to see, reading between the lines of so many people putting themselves on the internet for everyone to see? The web, named so for good reason. Mycroft asked her to search for threats, things he could control, but there were deeper things with their fingers on the pulse of revolting humanity.

This one was called Moriarty, and he wanted Sherlock. They had… _history_. It must have felt like some kind of claim, to Moriarty. He would learn better.

He could not have Sherlock, of course. No one could. He was hers and hers alone, from here to there, from now to eternity, round and round the garden. She wanted to know what his whimpers tasted like. What tracks his tears carved in his cheeks. Mycroft was exceedingly careful, as he always was--there were no recent pictures, not here, but she kept an updated image in her mind and thought on it often. When was it, exactly, that she’d become aware of how handsome a man Sherlock grew up to be? 

No matter now. This man, this Moriarty, could be useful to her. Would be useful. She wouldn’t have brought him here if he could not be used, and he would not have come.

The way Mycroft spoke about him was with his usual condescension paired with a thrilling amount of forced casualness. He didn’t want her interested. But Mycroft couldn’t keep anything from her, not really. So she learned about the man who was the spider at the center of the web, and when the time was right she asked for a Christmas present. 

And poor Mycroft, who only wanted her to be happy, really, and only wanted to save his little country on an island, agreed. 

Today would be about theater. Posturing. A taste of the dramatic. The dance was usually an unconscious chatter in the back of her mind but this was different. This was special. Eurus knelt down on her white rug in her white clothes until the motion sensor lights dimmed, and she waited for her Christmas present. Poor Mycroft didn’t know yet. He would. He would know and remember and hate himself.

Again.

Eurus had become especially talented in making Mycroft hate himself. It wasn’t quite the game that Sherlock was going to be, not nearly, because Mycroft really was cold and clever and calculating, but that made it all the more interesting when she finally got him to direct the smallest portion of his heated passions in self-loathing.

Then he locked everything away again and ceased being fun. Sherlock wouldn’t be like that. Sherlock would be fun until he broke. Then he would be better. 

The door hissed and started to rotate, more theatricality. A man walked in. Wearing black to her white, reeking of money and power to her plain scrubs and her helplessness. Perfect mirrors, Eurus thought absently. As though she had sent him a copy of the script, and he following it to the letter.

He did not look afraid, or intrigued, or apathetic. He looked nothing and everything at once.

Suicide, Eurus thought. A brief realization, but not a surprising one. Like Sherlock. Bored, bored madmen. Everything falling into place, so easy, so easy.

“I’m your Christmas present,” Moriarty drawled. He sauntered to the glass, eyes black and fearless. Sexual. Powerful. Sex as power. Eurus had never seen it so blatant before, an advertisement of sex and pain. If she hadn’t already tasted that combination on her own terms she might be tempted to try it on his. He shrugged, masculinity on clear display, an offer, a declaration. “So. What’s mine?”

Perfection. Just enough to whet Mycroft’s sense of danger. A tingle, unstoppable now. Eurus glanced at the closest of the cameras and the danger-tingle faded from her fingertips into a distant buzz--Mycroft fading from immediate consideration. He would not, could not, put a stop to this. Any agency he might have had ended the moment Moriarty touched down on her island. Before that--or, maybe, he hadn’t had a chance as soon as Eurus decided that she wanted the spider in her own lair.

He was close. Right against the glass. Nothing to prove but proving it anyway. Could she kill him? Would she? Would she try and fail? No combination evoked his sense of self preservation. Bored madmen. Her life, a series of bored madmen parading past her glass. 

She came closer to the glass as well, meeting his dead shark eyes and thrilling in the presence of so monstrous a specimen of humanity. No idea how she was about to change his life. The word took shape on her tongue and she felt it, the point of no return as it slipped like an eel over her lips: “Redbeard.”

“I’m listening.” 

Eurus rolled her eyes, _really_. No one was watching now. The game narrowed to two players and it was so exhausting pretending when there was no one else watching.

“You want Sherlock,” she said.

Moriarty nodded once, slow. “Your brother.”

Pleasure. “Mycroft told you?”

“He lied.”

“He does try.”

“And I always thought ‘big brother’ was a bad joke. Doesn’t pull any punches in regards to literary irony, does he?”

“He’s not the one I care about,” Eurus said sharply. “Nor you. Don’t pretend with me, _not me_. What Mycroft is means nothing to you. But Sherlock-”

That nod again, the steady weave of a snake before the strike. “Broken. Barely put together again.”

“My once and future playmate,” she said with some small pride. “You see it?”

“One thread pulled-”

“He’s beautiful, screaming. Breathtaking.”

Their breath fogged the glass between them.

“Redbeard,” Moriarty said, after a pause exactly the right length.

“You can’t have him. Not really, not permanently. You know that, now. He isn’t yours to burn.”

The first sign of surprise flashed into his dead eyes. Eurus revelled in it (she did this to a man like that, surprised him, caught him off guard, they all underestimated her, every one of them) and hated it both (disappointing, they’ll all disappointing in the end, I’m cleverer than all of them, all of them put together). 

“How did you-?”

Don’t _insult_ me, not you, I can see the fire in your eyes. You want to watch it all burn, burn right down to the ground. I was that way too, before they stopped me. I want it to burn. I want him to burn more. He burns so brightly already, don’t you see it? Don’t you want to watch his flame burn out? You and I want to see that white light bury itself in ashes. There will be no phoenix rising from his charred remnants. When he falls and fails he will _burn_.”

“I don’t get to keep him?” Moriarty mused. He stepped back, paced, shiny black shoes like fleas clicking on the floor. Turning, wider and wider circles. Running out the clock.

“It’s the only way,” Eurus said, and hated the desperation she only understood that she was feeling when the words flew from her lips, hoped that he couldn’t hear it in her voice.

“You’ll get him,” she said, softer now. “You will, he’ll be close enough to taste, and you’ll have the sweetest little games.” 

Moriarty continued to pace, his eyes fixed on her face as he plodded his slow way from one side of the room to the other. A disconcerting effect--like he was the one in the cage instead of her. Like the glass was there not to protect him from her, but the other way around. A tiger, golden-eyed and devouring. A shark, swimming so he wouldn’t drown in his own apathy.

“More importantly,” she said. “Much better. He’ll keep _you_.”

“What do I care?” Moriarty said, smiling with his dead eyes. “I’ll be dead.”

“You will make him. You’ll be there, always, when he closes his eyes. When he loves. When he hates. His dark mirror.”

Moriarty stopped pacing. It took several long seconds for Eurus to realize that the feeling she was experiencing was relief. She was off, today. Unfortunate. Something about the way he moved--it made her feel as though she were sharing the room with a predator. Something dangerous. Like she was small and fragile, and, while unique, it was a feeling she would rather not revisit.

Finally, finally, “How?”

Eurus breathed. Again. Triumphant.

“Redbeard.”

A flash of something bright and dangerous in Moriarty’s dark eyes, sparks brought to life and smothered. “You said,” he said.

“A childhood… pet,” Eurus said. “Poor thing. Left us too soon. Sherlock has always been so sentimental about his pets.”

Moriarty tipped his head back and scratched at the end of his chin. “By all accounts he’s the man without a heart,” he mused. “I’ve been watching him for years. He’s alone. Always alone. Not the type for _pets_.”

“He is. He will. He has always been the most emotional of all of us. Someday he’ll find one he wants to keep.”

“And that’s how I get Sherlock Holmes to keep me forever after I’ve offed myself,” Moriarty said, cruel, mocking. “Don’t look at me like that, don’t be _obvious_. If I don’t keep him and he still burns then there’s only one option. Kill his pet and die before he can exact revenge. Did you really want me to come here so you could tell me to kill myself in front of your brother? That’s very assuming of you.”

Eurus shrugged, letting one shoulder raise and fall perfunctorily. “You seem the type.”

Moriarty looked like he wanted to say something, his tongue working at the edges of his mouth. He didn’t.

“I’m your Christmas present,” Eurus said. She was pleased. Pleasure rippled through her, nuzzled at the base of her spine, tingled the ends of her hair. This Moriarty understood her. Understood them. Talking to him was like talking to Mycroft, without all the boring bits. “Where’s mine?”

“You seem so clever,” Moriarty said. “Why don’t you tell me?”

“I am clever,” she snapped. Irritation out of nowhere. Threads snapped which should have stayed intact.

The man on the other side of the glass came close again, loomed large in her vision, used every inch of his body to express, to intimidate, to threaten. If she were lesser she might have fallen for it. She watched him, counting seconds until he relaxed his arms, his shoulders, released the muscles in his neck, unwound himself vertebra by vertebra. 

“Prove it,” he said, and smiled his snake-smile. “Because I count to three, one, two, three. This little Holmes is trapped in a glass prison. Wee wee wee all the way to the bottom of the ocean.”

“Don’t underestimate me _don’t you underestimate me_.”

Moriarty spread his arms wide. “It’s hard not to,” he said. “With you being locked in a cage. If you were so smart why are you in there, and I’m out here?”

“Don’t be stupid you know why,” Eurus said. The pleasure was fading quickly into the dull throb of mediocrity she felt every other moment of every day. Every moment spreading the seeds of her eventual escape with every word she spoke. Every moment playing her violin, seeking perfection in every moment of every sweet and sour sound. Every moment of manipulation, every moment of her life.

“ _Prove it_ ,” Moriarty hissed.

“Mycroft is waiting for you to make a mistake,” she said. His eyes stayed flat and cold. “You won’t. You won’t make a mistake and he’ll never catch you because he’s waiting for you to make a move on his chessboard and you never will. You’re playing your own game, with different rules. And Mycroft won’t even see the rulebook until it’s too late. He knows you want Sherlock but he’ll never imagine that you would consider burning Sherlock’s heart to be a winning move--he thinks you want Sherlock to play with you. A cat with a mouse. He isn’t like us. Mycroft has never felt what it feels like to burn. You have. I have. I was incautious when I was a child, too eager to experience it. The flames. I’ve learned since then. 

“The reason that I’m in here is because I want to be in here. I’m underestimated here. I’m contained. Safe. I give Mycroft what he thinks he wants and in return I get to rule the world. Do you understand that my choice of words when I give Mycroft his reports influences his every action? I say ‘influence’ instead of ‘persuasion’ and another ten thousand British troops are sent to Afghanistan instead of Iraq. I say ‘urge’ instead of ‘precaution’ and the next Prime Minister is a woman and she feels very strongly against immigration. Don’t you get it, don’t you see?” 

Eurus laughed. It burbled through the glass room like the last gasping breath of a drowning man. “The lunatic is running the asylum,” she said. “I own this place. I own you. I own Mycroft. I own Sherlock. I’m not a prisoner. I’m a fucking empress; you should see me in a crown.”

Moriarty stayed silent on the other side of the glass, so silent that Eurus could hear when her breathing slowed, steadied.

“It would suit you," he said. "And the details?” he asked at last.

“Up to you. Although…” she pretended to think. “Your brother. A station manager? I think you’ve always secretly wanted to see yourself on film.”

A single, slow nod. Moriarty did not smile now. “You can get out whenever you want to,” he said.

“Glass is so fragile,” Eurus said. “Don’t you think?”

“There’s a factory,” he said slowly. “Closed. Condemned. It has a blue roof. They made car batteries.”

“I’ll find it,” she said.

“I know.”

Footsteps outside, and the slow churn of the door to her cell. It would be Mycroft. In person, of course. 

Moriarty slipped his hands in his pockets and found his smile again. There was something missing in it. Eurus knew what it was. It was one thing to contemplate death--another to plan it. She hoped - in an abstract way - that he found it as amusing to plan his death as she had.

The door spun open and Mycroft strode in, overconfident, aggressive. Overcompensating. It was all Eurus could do not to roll her eyes and give the whole game away.

“Did you two have a nice chat?” Mycroft asked.

“Take him away now,” Eurus commanded, and turned her back. “He’s boring. Just like all the others.”

“I think she likes me,” Moriarty stage-whispered. 

“Indeed,” Mycroft said. “I’m so pleased to hear that you two _got along_.” Eurus didn’t need to be facing them to imagine it--Mycroft’s sour face, the wheels spinning in circles inside of his head. Moriarty would be interrogated, of course, before he left. He would say nothing. Dead men tell no tales. She would be cajoled. Bribed. Tempted, with sweet words and sweeter treats. She would lie. He would know.

“If you would come with me?” Mycroft said, charades upon charades. Chivalrous and demanding, fancy and steel.

Moriarty smiled with his voice. “Why Mister Holmes. I thought you would never ask. Anything would be better than this side of crazytown.” They took two synchronized steps toward the door, then syncopation as Moriarty stopped, turned back.

“Merry Christmas, clever Eurus,” he said. 

“Yes, goodbye now. Leave. Leave leave.” She moved nothing but her lips, her lungs, her diaphragm. She stood as a statue, feeling their movements in subtleties in the air on her skin. 

The clack of footsteps. The soft rush of the door. Silence. Eurus counted to five hundred, until the first of Mycroft’s men tried to restrain Moriarty. The potentialities of thoughts wove around her like a net. She reached for her violin, cradled carefully in a nest of white sheets on her bed. And while Moriarty was upstairs, negotiating with hands and feet and teeth, she thought of Sherlock and started to play. 

Sherlock. Sherlock burned, his heart burned, a smoking hole of char in the middle of his chest. Losing another pet. She could imagine clearly, so clearly, the devastation. What he would look like when he finally broke to pieces. When she broke him into tiny little bits, again. Her brother was a creature who only looked beautiful when he was suffering. And she wasn’t a monster--she had a soft spot for beauty.

“Oh Sherlock,” she sighed, pausing with the violin tucked into her chin. “Sherlock, my love. I owe you a fall.”

She played and played and played and played. The strings of the Stradivarius thrummed with life beneath her fingers. Every note felt like another grain of sand, tumbling down into the reservoir of the hourglass. Every moment was a moment that brought Sherlock Holmes closer to her. Closer to his death. Closer to beauty.


End file.
